


Jam Sandwich

by tangledinink



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Hallucinations, M/M, Schizophrenia, bald naked cats, mentions of drug use
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-31
Updated: 2014-07-31
Packaged: 2018-02-11 05:14:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,274
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2054994
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tangledinink/pseuds/tangledinink
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Karkat knows better than to leave Gamzee on his own when he gets like this... even if it does mean going over to his house at 2 in the goddamned morning.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Jam Sandwich

**Author's Note:**

  * For [VillainousReaper](https://archiveofourown.org/users/VillainousReaper/gifts).



When Karkat Vantas’ cell phone started vibrating against his temple at two in the morning, his first reaction was to be annoyed as fuck. Groaning loudly, he twisted around in the sheets for a moment before his brain finally figured out how to tell his hands to move, and they managed to gain enough competence to press buttons. After a bit of fumbling, he managed to pick up the stupid phone, sort of just stabbing at the screen blindly as the brightness it emitted blinded him and burned his eyeballs..  
“What?” he groaned into the speaker. He was too tired to actually pick up his head- he just left it lying there against the pillow, the screen of his iPhone now plastered to his slightly sweaty cheek. He could have just checked caller ID to see who was actually calling him, but that would have been way too much work. This person better not expect him to be nice or some shit, because A; did they know who they were calling? and B; it was two in the goddamned morning and he had class to get his ass to in four unholy hours.  
“Hey bro?” the voice on the other end of the line was kind of soft and wavery, and terribly deep even though it cracked a little. It was instantly recognizable as Gamzee’s, but… not exactly. Gamzee’s voice usually had this dumb, worry-free, kind of floaty tone. He… didn’t sound like that right now.  
Honestly, right now he just sounded fucking terrified.  
“Gamzee?” he managed to slur out, his eyebrows knitting with concern as he rolled slightly in bed, flopping onto his back and kicking his blankets out of the way. “What the fuck…?”  
“There are things in my house, bro.” his voice was hushed and frantic, as if he was trying to make sure someone, or something, wouldn’t hear him.  
“Things in your…? What in name of nasty pulsating stripper dick are you talking about?” Karkat grumbled.  
“I can hear them there are motherfuckers in my house they’re crawling around and sayin’ shit and I can’t make ‘em be motherfucking quiet.”   
Oh. Oh. Wait a minute. That’s what’s going on.  
“Gamzee, there’s nothing in your house. You’re fine. Just turn on the lights.”  
“I can’t.”  
“Why the fuck can’t you?”  
“Because then I’ll see them.” he whined quietly. “I’m scared to. Come over.”  
“Gamzee, it’s two in the goddamned morning.”  
“Please. Please motherfucking best friend please come over.” he whimpered, and he just sounded so fucking pitiful and terrified and worked up that there was no way he could say no. Besides, Karkat knows that these episodes that Gamzee has are… not pleasant. He’s seen them before and he’d be a total asshole and kind of a terrible friend, (and person,) to leave him alone right now, regardless of the time.  
“Yeah. Okay. I’ll be over in two minutes, alright? Just hang on.” The two of them lived in the same building, just a couple floors off, so it’s not as if it’s a long trek.   
“Don’t hang up.”  
“I’m not gonna. Calm down. Just chill the fuck out and listen to me, alright? You’re safe and nothing’s gonna attack you and I’m gonna be there in five seconds and prove to you that there’s nothing in that apartment that can hurt you.” he lectured, dragging himself from his bed and rummaging around the dark room in order to find some pajama pants or something to wear and some shoes, because there’s no way he’s going into Gamzee’s filthy apartment in bare feet.  
“That won’t motherfucking fix everything.” he nearly snapped. It was obvious he was beginning to get agitated… which wasn’t really unusual, at all. And sort of made sense. After all, why the hell wouldn’t he be? Gamzee always started to get kind of aggressive and upset when he got like this.   
“Yeah, but it’s a start.” he sighed, frowning a bit and pulling on some red plaid pajama bottoms scrunched up at the foot of his bed and toeing on his sneakers, making sure to grab his keys on the kitchen counter on his way out the door, starting the (what seems like) terribly long and arduous trek to Gamzee’s.  
“They won’t shut up, Karkat.”  
“I know. Just don’t listen to them. They’re lying to you, got it?” he lectured, narrowing his eyes slightly as he made his way down the hall and up the stairs, rushing himself a bit. He knew better than to leave Gamzee on his own during these times. Being on the phone with him was good at least, but… not enough. He tended to get into some bad shit when he was on his own. Especially since he was… recovering.

It had taken years of convincing and pleading and yelling and interventions to get Gamzee off of drugs. It had also taken a lot of frustration and crying and anger. And seriously, getting him to quit fucking heroin was not easy on anyone, especially not Gamzee. It was hard. It was pretty horrific, actually. Karkat had to move in with him and stay in his apartment taking care of him and making sure he didn’t relapse for weeks, and to say it had been a rough couple of weeks would be a ridiculous understatement. Particularly since the entire reason he had started taking in the first place was to, as he put it, quiet the voices. He really couldn’t count how many times he had had to mop up vomit, lock doors, soothe crying, or talk him down.   
But, come on, that’s what friends were for, wasn’t it? And Karkat was still firmly standing by his belief that this was still better than drugs. They had been totally destroying his life and it was just… not fun to watch him falling apart. He had been clean for six months now. It was harder in a lot of ways now, sure, but it was also better in a lot more ways.  
This was one of the ways it was worse. Being woken up in the middle of the night to go and tend to his schizophrenic episodes was definitely worse.   
But he would still do it. It was eons better than waking up in the middle of the night to a hospital call telling him that they had his friend, he had OD’ed again, could he come and pick him up?

“They won’t stop talking to me.” The voice on the other side of the telephone was shaking now, as if he were about to cry.  
“I know. Just calm down, alright? You don’t have to listen to their fucking bullshit. I’m almost there.” he assured him, nearly bounding up the stairs at this point. He just really hoped that Gamzee’s door would be unlocked. It would take a lot of convincing to get him to get up and come over and unlock it. He wasn’t even sure if he was capable of it right now.

Luckily for the both of them, when he finally managed to reach his apartment, (number 419, something Gamzee had been truly devastated about,) the door swung open easily under his hand.  
“Alright. I’m here. You can hear me, right? I’m guessing you’re in your room?” he asked, shutting the door behind him with his foot and wandering over towards the direction he knew Gamzee’s bedroom was in. There was a staticy little “mm-hmm” in confirmation from the speakers.  
He pulled the door open, immediately hearing Gamzee whine in protest, burying his gray-and-white smeared face in his over sized palms.  
“Calm down, assholes, it’s just me.” he huffed.  
“Don’t turn on the lights.” he insisted.  
“Alright, alright, I won’t. I’m not turning on any lights. Look at me, my fingers far, far away from any light switches.” he said, rolling his eyes as he closed to door behind him. Gamzee was curled up in a little ball in the corner of his bed, just like Karkat expected him to be. To Karkat, the room was totally quiet except for the occasional whimper or grunt from his friend, dimly lit but clearly void of threats. But he knew well enough to know that wasn’t how to seemed to Gamzee.  
He carefully climbed onto the bed next to him, scooting close to the clown and wrapping a hesitant arm around him. Gamzee had never hurt him on purpose, but when he got like this, he sometimes lashed out or just straight up flipped his shit, and Karkat preferred not to get caught in the cross-fire. As such, he had always figured it would be better for everyone if he employed a slight air of caution when he was trying to calm him down.  
“Gamzee look at me.” he instructed. It took a few moments but eventually he did. “I want you to look around very carefully. There is nothing here. Nothing in here can hurt you and no one is after you. It’s not fucking real, Gamzee, it’s just the goddamned stupid voices trying to fuck with you and they’re lying little cumstains who don’t know shit. Got it?”  
He took a watery little breath and then nodded, tensing and untensing his fists.   
“Now, I’m gonna turn on the light-“  
“Don’t!”  
“Gamzee-“  
“Don’t motherfucking do it, bro. Don’t.”  
“Gamzee, there’s nothing fucking here. You’re fine.”  
“You just can’t motherfuckin’ see ‘em!” he nearly sobbed now, looking absolutely pathetic. His face was a smear of a makeup and piercings and tears and snot, and he looked horrific. It looked like he hadn’t slept in a week and hadn’t showered or ate in twice as long. Karkat groaned loudly, resisting the urge to smack his own face, repeatedly. He knew that this wasn’t really Gamzee’s fault and he should at least try to be more patient, but it was ridiculous and frustrating. Even more so than usual when it was taking place when he ought to be sleeping.

He was about to throw himself into another lecture-slash-pep talk when something brushed up against his leg. For a second, his heart froze and his stomach twisted and the thought flashed through his mind that oh god, Gamzee was right, there are things in here. But in the next moment he had turned enough to realize that it was not any sort of ghoul or threat. It was just Gamzee’s stupid cat. He had had the thing for eons, he didn’t even know how old it was anymore. It sure looked old with how ugly it was, all splotchy and hairless. Granted, it had been that way its entire life, but that didn’t make it any less revolting. But regardless, Gamzee adored the damned thing. It had its own bed, (though it always slept in Gamzee’s,) and a collar and leash and a million toys and was named Jam Sandwich, of all the dumbass things to name a cat. It was just chilling out near the foot of the bed, stretching out its paws and yawning, acting as if its owner wasn’t having some sort of mental breakdown or something.  
Karkat spent a couple minutes just reveling in how disgusting a creature it was, before a thought struck him and he paused a moment. As much as he hated to touch the damned thing, he shifted enough to scoop it up, dragging the bald feline over into his lap so he could present it to Gamzee. The cat didn’t fuss the entire way, seemingly totally okay with being picked up and man-handled.  
“Gamzee.” Karkat said firmly again, rousing the other male from his own thoughts and sniffling. “I want you to look at Sandwich.”  
Gamzee sort of just swallowed another little gulp and then nodded, though he didn’t really seem to know where any of this is going.  
“Does she look freaked out at all?” He received a hesitant shake of a head in response. “Is she concerned? Or upset because there are intruders in her apartment?” Another head shake.  
“Exactly.” he said firmly, passing the cat over to Gamzee, pressing her into his hands. His arms immediately wrapped around her, hugging the complacent kitty close to his chest. “She’s totally fine because she knows there’s nothing in here that can hurt you. Which is how you should be able to know that everything is fucking fine. If she was hissing and flipping her shit, then you could be upset. But she’s not. Because it’s not real and none of it can actually hurt you. So just… get a grip, alright?”   
Gamzee gave a tiny little nod, his shuddery breath finally beginning to even out. He could visibly be seen slowly grounding himself and calming down.   
“We promise you’re safe, alright?” Karkat said, a bit gentler now. “I know the voices suck and aren’t easy to deal with but you’re okay. If you just calm down and realize that they’re not real, and you don’t have to do anything they tell you, everything is gonna calm down and they’re gonna fade of eventually. Okay?”  
Gamzee nodded again, his body slowly unwinding, his muscles untensing beneath the skin.  
“You gonna be okay?”  
Another nod , and this time Karkat was the one relaxing, sighing softly as he released all the pent-up breath in his lungs.   
“Alright.” he sighed, relieved. “I’ll stay here for the rest of the night but I’ve gotta go to class in the morning. But it’ll be better then when it’s light out. So just lay down and try to get some sleep, okay?”   
“Okay.” Gamzee agreed blearily, hugging Jam Sandwich tight, and that’s how Karkat knew that he was going to be fine.


End file.
